The Hague

Flower by Amare (Or: Summer days)

Posted on August 4, 2026 by Niki

Marco took some photos of the flowers outside of Amare, a multi-use building for culture, education, music and dance. Of course, my favorite is the one with the tram in the background!

Marco also pointed out that if you look closely you can spot a bee at the bottom of the sunflower. You can also see some benches; this is the perfect place to sit when you don’t mind a bit of sun.

Here’s a photo of some pretty purple flowers, because, well, purple.

We can’t really complain too much this summer. We did have a heat wave in June, but lately it has mostly been temperatures of 25C/77F, although yesterday and today were around 31C/88F.

Tip for those in the Netherlands: there will be a partial solar eclipse (about 90%) on Wednesday, August 12. Article in Dutch.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Centrum, Flowers, Summer, trams | Leave a comment

Vondelstraat (Or: Flowers in The Hague)

Posted on June 24, 2026 by Niki

Last weekend, Marco went to Kelly’s Expat Shopping. Along the way, he snapped a photo of some flowers on Vondelstraat (straat = street).

Back in 2021 I took a photo of a nice, tall sunflower on the same street. While at Kelly’s, Marco got me some Cheerios, yellow mustard and sour cream & chive pretzels. Yum!

The temperatures are rising here in The Netherlands. Europe swelters under deadly ‘Omega’ heatwave, more records expected (Reuters). Things are pretty bad in France, with Paris seeing temperatures of 41C or 105F. Luckily, things will finally begin to cool down in southern Europe later tomorrow and Friday — which of course means the heat is coming our way! We don’t have it as bad as Paris though. Today was 33C/91F in The Hague, with temperatures rising to around 35C/95F Friday here in The Hague.

To give you an idea, it’s currently 28C/82F in the apartment. But, if you aren’t used to air conditioning it really isn’t that bad (except when you’re trying to sleep – that is indeed annoying). Air conditioning still isn’t common in the Netherlands, although it is of course increasing in popularity thanks to summers like this.

Check out the live blog about the weather (in Dutch) at nos.nl.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Flowers, Summer, Weather | Leave a comment

Buitenhof (Or: Blow Up Jubilee 2026)

Posted on June 16, 2026 by Niki

There’s still a bit of time to check out the art installation Blow Up Jubilee found in parts of The Hague’s city centre. It runs until 21 June. Here’s a look at some art in the Buitenhof pond:

For other photos, check out the link above and scroll down slightly to click on ‘More photos’. The craziest one is probably the tunnel through the green balloon (the one called ‘Tunnel’ by Steve Massam).

I’m looking forward to the good weather coming on Friday! Up to 32C/90F, with the usual chance of thunderstorms because of it. Unfortunately I do have to work. Oh well!

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Art, Centrum | Leave a comment

Flowers and rain (Or: Lilac bushes)

Posted on May 18, 2026 by Niki

Recently Marco compared this photo of a lilac bush in The Hague:

Just a bit of spring while we wait for summer. For the longest time we had some decent weather and not much rain, but the last week or so has been rain, rain, rain. We have a few more days of this to go, but it looks like the long holiday weekend (off on Monday for Whit Monday) will feature some nice weather, with highs around 22-24C or 71-75F. For the Netherlands, that’s pretty good! I am looking forward to soaking up some sun myself.

279 flights delayed at Schiphol as security queues, border checks disrupt operations from nltimes.nl

MV Hondius arrives at port of Rotterdam; Hantavirus risk “low” for world population: WHO, also from nltimes.nl

The Japanese Garden at Clingendael is open until June 7 (denhaag.nl)

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Flowers | Leave a comment

Year of the horse (Or: Legos in the Mall of the Netherlands)

Posted on April 21, 2026 by Niki

Last month, Marco, Roger and I visited the Mall of the Netherlands to check out the new Takumi location, which offered sushi as well as the usual ramen. The sushi was pretty good but the service was a bit “off”, probably because of being located in a mall. It didn’t quite have the same feel as the other locations.

Before that we also visited the Lego store in the mall. Here are a few photos of the sets they had on display. This first set was for the Year of the Horse (Chinese New Year).

They also had a cool looking aquarium:

I am not really a fan of Legos, as I am not that creative, but I do enjoy seeing what others have built. If I had to choose I would prefer to put a jigsaw puzzle together! Even that takes ages…

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Malls, Takumi | Leave a comment

100th anniversary (Or: Bijenkorf in The Hague)

Posted on April 7, 2026 by Niki

Bijenkorf in The Hague celebrated its 100th anniversary over the weekend. Marco took a lovely picture of the decorations on the outside:

Of course the decorations are in yellow and green, the colors of The Hague flag.

And because I think they are awesome, here’s a look at some of the stained glass inside the staircases. One great reason to skip the elevator:

Categories: The Hague, Shopping, Daily Dutch living | Tags: Bijenkorf | Leave a comment

A good way to commemorate (Or: 50th anniversary 10km CPC medal)

Posted on March 16, 2026 by Niki

A colleague of mine ran the 10km at the City-Pier-City (CPC) run over the weekend. The starting point was at the Malieveld and it went away from the city centre, towards Scheveningen. I thought the medal was too gorgeous not to share:

It has, a nice, solid weight with a lovely finish. I am not sure if they are usually this pretty or if it was because it was the 50th anniversary of the run. Some of the buildings featured include (I think) the Haagse Toren, the Hoftoren, the Kurhaus, the ferris wheel in Scheveningen and the Ridderzaal.

Luckily the weather was good yesterday. Earlier last week it looked like it would rain most of the afternoon. Though my colleague did mention that there were so many people there that it was hard to find anyone as even WhatsApp wasn’t working well. Ticket sales were really fast this year, with almost everything gone after the first day, so it makes sense that the event would be quite crowded.

In other news, here is your “What the…” news story of the day:

Defense employee arrested after large haul of military equipment found in home from nltimes.nl. “The search of the residence on Bilderdijkstraat uncovered weapons, bulletproof vests, helmets, field beds, tents, knives, tools, tablets, ammunition, and cash. Two buses were used to try and remove the items, but a fully loaded Defense truck was later called in due to the volume of material. The total number of items seized has not been confirmed.”

Categories: The Hague, Uncategorized | Tags: Malieveld | Leave a comment

Across the road (Or: A misty dag in The Hague)

Posted on March 10, 2026 by Niki

Earlier this week the Netherlands had a few misty mornings. It was pretty interesting to see most of The Hague’s skyline gone.

Here’s a random picture of the mist, near the Paleistuin.

Here’s a bonus picture of a very quiet moment in De Passage, the covered shopping area in The Hague’s city centre. The flowers in the middle were a nice touch.

It’s a pretty quiet week here. Unfortunately, spring seems to have disappeared again, as the temperatures are more around 10C/50F. The random misty mornings make it colder, too.

Here are some random events coming up:

Sunday, March 15: City-Pier-City (CPC) run, with distances of 5km, 10km and a half marathon.

Sunday, March 15: St. Patrick’s Day festival at the Grote Markt. So you can run in the CPC and then have a nice cold one.

Municipal elections, March 18: information from The Hague International Centre (I will definitely be voting, since I can actually vote in this one!)

Last Sunday of each month, e.g. 29 March: salsa and bachata lesson outside the Bijenkorf on the Grote Marktstraat at 13:00. So random I just had to mention it.

See more events at DenHaag.com.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Centrum, De Passage | Leave a comment

Snowy bridges in The Hague (Or: A temporary white world)

Posted on February 15, 2026 by Niki

The Netherlands got to see a bit of snow today, although it won’t last much longer. It started snowing around 16:00 here in The Hague, but the temperature is expected to increase overnight to 6C/42F. A very quick white world!

Marco took some lovely photos of the snow before it began to melt, though. Check it out.

And here is one of the bridge:

The crunchiest snow was actually on the bridge. So we got to hear the pleasant Crunch! Crunch! Crunch! under our feet when we crossed over it.

There wasn’t too many negative effects from the brief storm. Of course, Schiphol Airport cancelled some flights (NOS.nl in Dutch) and a car here in The Hague hit a tram (omroepwest.nl in Dutch), but that’s about it.

There’s a few more photos of the snow over at the TheHague’s Reddit page.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Weather, Winter | Leave a comment

Homer Simpson’s graffiti (Or: One man’s trash)

Posted on February 9, 2026 by Niki

Marco and I recently came across some graffiti on a few underground trash containers in The Hague. I just had to stop and take a picture of the Homer Simpson on the side of the trash container:

A lot of places in The Hague use these underground trash containers these days. You lift up the lid, place your trash bag inside and close the lid. Closing the lid causes the trash to drop down automatically. There are sensors to let the city know when the trash container is almost full so that they come and empty them on time, using a lift system to pull the entire container out of the ground and then drop it into the garbage truck. Some streets seem like they have trash containers every 50 meters, although you will still see some folks who leave their trash next to a full container. This is illegal and can result in a fine.

Back on the topic of The Simpsons – I probably stopped watching that show regularly around season 15, but I have fond memories of “Animation domination!” on Sunday nights on FOX. Most of my cultural references come from that show.

Have a look at this Homer Simpson statue on a bench that Marco and I spotted in NYC back in 2012 (!). It must be gone by now, as it was already pretty battered then.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: Graffiti | Leave a comment